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June 8, 2011

Last Friday evening, Wayzata High School seniors had their all-night- graduation lock-in party at Brunswick Center, and "Dontar" was there to entertain the grads.

Thanks to Mark & Lori at A Touch of Magic, my good friend, Craig Carlson, and I hauled the "Dontar" machine to Brooklyn Park and had the machine work the crowd for 2.5 hours, and they loved him.

For the first hour, I was inside the machine, while Craig was the barker, calling for people to experience the wonder of our mechanical creation. For the second hour, Craig was inside the machine and I was able to lead people to the machine, encourage them to interact with "Dontar", dance with him, etc. I enjoyed being inside AND outside the machine, as each one gave me different ways to have fun with the grads.

As people approached the machine, Dontar came to life (as much as a mechanical robot can), and interacted with the students, then delivered some funny "life advice" that they could take with them. Some lucky grads also won the old "fortune-telling fish novelty", and some won a real deck of playing cards (that matched the ones spread around inside the machine).

Craig, as "Dontar"

Steady stream of people for 2 hours

People loved to stand around and discuss whether "Dontar" was real, or if he really was a mechanical machine. Some stayed around for 10-15 minutes discussing it. It was great!